I’ve been giving this a lot of thought and have come to the conclusion that Julie Watai is the coolest, most well-connected female otaku in all of Japan.

From her Hardware Girls photo sessions, to her stints as a gravure model and her sessions as a club DJ and remix artist, Julie continually and nimbly crosses the lines between super nerdy and somethin' else.

Lately, she’s been busy with mishmash＊Julie Watai, a musical collaboration with T. Mishima, long associate of Japanese indie music tiki head Cornelius.

Oh...one more thing about Julie…SHE ALSO HACKS FURBYS!!

All of which leads us to mishmash＊Julie Watai’s latest song, “Go Furby Go”; an ode to the toy that Julie loves to “circuit bend” when dressed as a maid.

And while Momoiro Clover Z has been assigned the duty of delivering the official Furby 2012 endorsement deal via their new commercials, Julie and co. have a furry saga of their own to unfold before your eyes below...

The full length version of “Go Furby Go” will be available on October 26th from iTunes, Amazon, and Google Play.

It’s been fascinating to
see my buddy Franck Shigetora develop his cyberpunk music project VALKILLY over
the years. Cobbled together from memories of Megazone 23, Captain Power, and an
‘80s-era vision of a tech-driven future far more dangerous and sexy than the
one we wound up getting. VALKILLY is Franck’s personal SF mythology made
manifest, so it is genuinely thrilling to see him venture into full promotion
video mode with leather-clad lead singer KILLeeeee at his side.

In order to operate a successful business in this overheated hothouse environment, you need a SERIOUS GIMMICK to help separate yourself from the competition. Enter the latest contender on the block: the Shinjuku Kabukicho Robot Restaurant...

Built at a cost of 10 billion yen (they say...), the Robot Restaurant combines garish lighting, with female robots and flesh & blood cabaret girls for a hallucinatory experience that will hopefully do for the jaded, thrill-seeking salarymen of Japan what “Chuck E. Cheese” does for little kids.

For an entrance fee of around US$37.00, patrons and stare slack-jawed as enormous Cutey Honey-esque robots roll around controlled by comely “pilots”.

Army girls patrol the allies of smiles for enemy robots on armored vehicles that would shame anything in Disneyland’s Main Street Electrical Parade!

They also zip around through technicolor LED landscapes on actual motorbikes!

There's even musical shows and revues performed by the girls, including Japanese taiko drumming and a marching band!

And should any of this phantasmagorical spectacle fail to entertain, you can always lose your mind on cheap whiskey and chain smoke like a chimney while staring at the otherworldly décor!

In truth, the joint is more like a kyabakura, or “cabaret club”, than an actual restaurant. Three measly food items in all are listed on the menu, a perfunctory measure probably because it's easier to get a license for food service than to apply for a “giant robots plus army girls and marching bands and motorcycles” license. Either way, here’s wishing the Shinjuku Kabukicho Robot Restaurant the very best of luck as it awkward rolls the human race one step closer to a well-deserved Robopocalypse.